BÜHLER, Johann Georg

BÜHLER, Johann Georg. Borstel bei Nienburg (Hannover) 19.7.1837 — Bodensee 8.4. 1898. German Indologist in India (1863-80) and Austria. Professor in Vienna. Son of Johann Georg B., a minister. Educated in Hannover, where he had among his teachers the philologists Ahrens and Kühner. In 1855 he came to Göttingen and began to study classical philology (E. Curtius et al.), Sanskrit (Benfey), Germanistics (Leo Meyer), Persian and Armenian (Ewald), Arabic (Wüstenfeld), archaeology, and philosophy. Ph.D. 1858 there in Greek, in autumn went to Paris and in 1859 to England to copy MSS. Remained in England until fall 1862, then back to Göttingen, where he was employed as an assistant in the University Library. However, the mediation of Max Müller brought him the chair of Oriental Languages at Elphinstone College in Bombay.

In Bombay he taught Sanskrit, Prākrit, and comparative grammar. He learnt quick­ly Marathi and studied practical Sanskrit under pandits. He succesfully taught his Indian students modern philological methods. For the government he compiled an extensive manual of Indian law. In 1866 he began travels on the search for the Sanskrit MSS. With Kielhorn he founded the Bombay Sanskrit Series. In 1868 GB left Elphinstone College and became acting educational inspector, later on a permanent basis in the search for the Sanskrit MSS, together with Kielhorn. From December 1869 to 1870 he was on a leave in Europe because of an illness. During his field trips he learnt Gujarati and became interested in epigraphy. Collected great amount of inscriptions in Gujarat, also visited Rajasthan and Kashmir, and collected no less than 2876 MSS. for the government. In 1877-79 again in Europe on a leave, married in 1878 in Switzerland with Mathilde Forrer, no children. He returned to India, but had to retire in 1880 because of a liver illness.

In 1880 GB returned to Europe and in 1881 got the Sanskrit chair at Vienna University, where he soon had many students and time for his research work, especially on the Dharmaśāstra, but also on palaeography, epigraphy and Jainism. He was one the founders of the WZKM and the first editor of the Grundriss (succeeded by Kielhorn). Bühler was one of the most important Sanskrit scholars and epigraphists of his time, and much encouraged German scholars to travel in India. He drowned during a canoeing excursion on Bodensee (alone, no details known, but also suicide has been suggested). Among his many students were Th. Bloch, Cartellieri, Dahlmann, Führer, Haberland, Hultzsch, Kirste, v. Mankowski, Morison, Schönberg, Ščerbatskoj, and Winternitz.